Get Shorty

Jesus, man. The comments are more revealing than the NYTimes article. Same old shit.

Life ain’t fair, but it’s your life and you gotta go live it the best you can and not be dragged down the emotional/mental drain hole of this stuff. There are far too many variables in the mating game to get hung up on one thing, thinking that we’re undesireable.

Heh, the self-proclaimed Newspaper of Record tries to offer its two cents about the IR issue now.

Makes you wish for the good old days of Judith Miller and Jayson Stark.

Personally, I can’t wait for the day when the Grey Lady goes bankrupt with the rest of these mainstream media rags.

uRB4N,

Are you even Asian? are you a full blooded Asian male raised by Asian parents?

You speak as if all asian females are the enemy, was your mother Asian? because you speak as if you either an adoptee among whites or someone who grew up with no strong Asian female/Asian Male relationships around. Either way it comes off as alot of deep seated self loathing and internalised racism.

How would it sound as if a asian female said “all asian males are burden for Asian women” are “sellouts” etc. Its just the same thing except youre just reversing it and trying to say it will make things better.

Do you think if you worship white females and denigrate Asian Women you will get respect from white society? that youre somehow “winning” against Asian females? that you will no be longer seen as a “gook” “chink” “slant” but rather a “man” just cause you have a white wife and have interracial babies?

Sounds like self loathing /assimilationist. Dont you see? Without both asian females and males there will be no more asian community. If everyone intermarries with whites in a few generations there will be no more asian people. Intermarriage with whites is genocide against Asian people and it is what European colonialists historically did when they colonised South America, Phillipines, Australia, and Vietnam in the 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. They tried to “breed” out the “savage” characteristics of non white people through intermarriage and racial assimilation of indigenious populations into european culture, enslaving the men, raping the women, forcing worship of a white christian god, forcing everone to speak the euro languages of the colonisers as well as killing all those non whites who opposed them. Today, the structure of euro/white supremacy continues this concept ableit in a more p.c form under the guise of and “westernisation”, which are racial terms even though they are often disregarded as such.(eg Japanese not being called Westerners even though by definition they are, but since they arent white they cant be westerners, cause only so called “caucasians” can be westerners, non whites can only be called “westernised” )

I find it unsual that some one who advocates genocide against the asian community through intermarriage and assimilation into the existing white power structure of society comes to an asian empowerment website…….

But i can hear your “everyone criticises but dont offer practical solutions”…..

well, its simple, start dating asian, find a beautiful asian female, get married, make beautiful asian babies, and have a beautiful asian family. Ignore those who arent interested.

Dont you see uRB4N? I see it clearly. Asian Women truly are beautiful, and so are Alpha Asian Men. Everything about us, our black hair, our golden skin, our noses, our lips, our face, our bodies, our culture, our honourable hearts, everything about us has beauty and value. We as a people, both male and female are beautiful, uRB4N. If you truly believed in Asian empowerment, i think youd see that too.

I’ve seen that academic paper before and some of the comments made were truly astounding. But if I remember correctly, it seemed as if a lot of those ignorant and over generalized statements came from women who were, what, second generation? They painted ALL Asian guys as being a bunch of overbearing, chauvinistic bastards, blah blah blah because it appeared the only Asian guys they knew still held some of that old world traditional culture. But why would any Asian guy want to date some Asian woman who has nothing but contempt for themselves and their heritage?

Of course this dynamic exists. We’ve been talking about this shit for years and years. You can’t change anyone’s mindset when it’s so twisted like that. The only thing you can do is change your response to the dynamic. And that’s why I say, go live your life the best you can and throw that shit to the side of the road. Get on with living and escape that drain hole. And if it means having to date white or latin women, then so be it. But I’d never rule out Asian women completely. I can’t say with the some broad paintbrush that all Asian women harbor hostility and resentment to their Asian counterparts. If you do encounter hostility, then don’t waste your time. Move on to something better, and find love and happiness where you can with whomever you can, then.

For me, bottom line is this: life’s too fucking short. Don’t waste your time on someone who wouldn’t waste their time on you. And that’s why I advise not getting so hung up on this. Doesn’t mean you have to like it or accept it (I certainly don’t), but you do have to live your life. This is your life and it’s ending minute by minute, so how do you want to live it?

@anna123 - thanks for your perspective. “Ignore those who aren’t interested.” Indeed. Unfortunately, I don’t seem to run into too many compatible Asian women that would lead towards dating. But I am not going to put my life on hold waiting for something that might not ever arrive.

I particularly like what you wrote:

“Dont you see? Without both asian females and males there will be no more asian community. If everyone intermarries with whites in a few generations there will be no more asian people. Intermarriage with whites is genocide against Asian people….”

I’ve become aware of that more and more when I recognize that my Eurasian nephews and nieces might not be so aware that they’re also Asian. It’s too easy for them to pass themselves off as being white or to disregard their other half. And it’s hard because of this western cultural imperialism—-it’s warped our perceptions of what beauty is. And you’re right: there’s nothing wrong with us. All this bullshit about height as the root cause blah blah blah. Black people have had to get their minds right too. “Black is beautiful” and “I’m black and I’m proud, I’ll say it out loud.” When are we going to come to that conclusion? When are we going to reject white people’s enforcing this notion that Asian men are not attractive? They don’t fucking know me, who I am, or what I can do. We can’t buy into these notions of other peoples’ cultural values of what constitutes attractiveness. They can eat hot steaming shit for all I care. Move forward and do not be denied.

Anna,

Very well said. Totally. Asian women are beautiful. We just have to realize/acknowledge that. And we Asian men often make our own unique cultural and personal statements. We really do need more AM/AF families, even if for no other reason than to say fuck you to society’s racism. (haha…I know this is extreme.)

Mojo:

But why would any Asian guy want to date some Asian woman who has nothing but contempt for themselves and their heritage?

Well, if she’s really hot….naw, I’m just kidding. Even if, it just ain’t worth it.

I agree with what you say. There may be trends in society, but we need to keep an open mind with people, regardless of race. I’m all for Asian guys dating outside, but inside is good too.

Etain,

Good points.

The real point here is, judging any demographic by a single physical characteristic reduces that group into simple stereotypes, thus dehumanizes them. Attaching a man’s worth to his height is the product of an old, outdated definition of masculinity that is very vulnerable to negative influences. It is no different than valuing a man by the length of his penis, or a woman by the size of her breasts, or the color of their skin, or their sexual preference, etc. As long as you play this game, sooner or later you’ll lose to an impossible standard that’s set by majority with the intention of keeping you in an inferior mindset. Every battle must first be won in the mind. If you adopt such negative values to define yourself, then you’ve already lost and everything else is pointless. The real issue we should tackle here isn’t whether or not Asians are shorter than whites, it’s the idea that somehow being short is a failure. We’ve long evolved past having to chase our dinner with our knuckles dragging on the ground. There is no inherent disadvantage in our modern (and supposedly enlightened) society with being short. Just the same as there’s nothing wrong with being Asian.

Great points kobukson. I remember someone half-jokingly (or perhaps half-seriously) noticing the same phenomenon of “fine” girls in Northern California versus Southern California. They noted that since there aren’t many “fine” girls in Northern California, the “fine” girls that do manage to appear have a huge sense of entitlement (often surrounding themselves with less “fine” girls) and feel that they can pick and choose among their potential suitors thereby coming off as “stuck up”. However, because there are so many “fine” girls in Southern California (supposedly because of the entertainment industry) many of the “fine” girls down south are alot more down to Earth, if not, somewhat attention-starved because the supply/compettition is so much greater.

Of course that’s was just an anecdotal conclusion, but still has a similar pattern to kobukson’s supply/demand and its affects on the female mentality.

Hello, I have a confession, I am 1 of 3 people posting as kobe. I have had a long discussion with the others and it is agreed that we will stop. The original kobe will survive a bad period in his social life, hoping maybe post at a later time.

Asian people are stereotyped as good people, this a weakness, we are the entire spectrum. We hope whatever contribution we have made is helpful to clarify our position in America. Good evening fellow Yellows.

@ Kobe

But are all three of you living in the same body?

Kobukson,

Even though i felt sick in my stomach reading your distasteful post,(i mean who the f talks about romantic love like that?) ultimately I agree with your vulgar assessment of the situation BUT NOT the logic behind why it exists or how to address it. You wrote;

“Self-interest will always trump any appeals to vague notions of shared community or solidarity.”

The problem isnt self interest, but how self interest and community have been seperated in Asian identities. Like they say, divide and conquer…if theres no sense of “Asian community” Asians themselves will do the bidding of the dominant majority, and will destroy their own community through intermarriage and assimilation into white society. As Frank Chin would say, if this happens “Asians as a social, cultural and political force will have been neutralised”

Also you wrote that;

“Asian men themselves bear responsibility for the IR disparity for:
1. Choosing safe, conservative Beta strategies rather than Alpha strategies.
2. Failing to “diversify the portfolio”.
3. Failing to be contrarian against existing oppressive structures”

Really? As an AZN female, i dont blame IR disparity on Asian males. I blame white people and their supremacist culture.

What your saying is like an Uncle Tom saying to all the other slaves

“The reason the situation is like this is because we havent proven ourselves worthy of freedom to our white masters,…its OUR fault we are slaves, we must work harder to show we are worthy of our freedom and humanity”

But Asian Males are inherently beautiful, valuable, thats the reason why white culture tries to destroy them so much.Tries to brainwash Asain women. Tries to model Asian-Non Asian relationships as the norm.

Why? because they FEAR US and our special abilities that arise from the union of a beautiful Asian Man and Asian Woman, our potential to create more Asian babies which will grow up speaking English, “westernised” with their own thoughts and dreams.Because in their eyes, it would humanise Asian people. White culture fears the Humanity of Asian people, because that would reveal that we are all equal,so destroying the myth of white superiority and with it white privilege, white power, and white supremacy.

Western culture has spent the last 500 years trying to build up white supremacy over non whites, with colonialism, imperialism, genocide, even darwinian science and eugenics. The last option now is to control our minds so that we willingly intermarriage our community into extinction.

Dont blame the victims, blame the victimisers

Asian Female hypersexualisation? -white racist patriarchy
Asian Male emasculation?-white racist patriarchy
Asian misrepresentation in the media?-white racist patriarchy
Bamboo Ceiling in the workplace?-white racist patriarchy
Promotion of IR as a cure to end social discrimination against Asians?…..white racist patriarchy

I blame the out-group, not the in-group. We never did anything wrong, we are innocent, and always have been. They are the criminal oppressors. Asians represent a force of honour, loyalty, rightousness, even in the face of repression and ugly discrimination we still kept our class.

IR is not the solution, its a symptom of the problem, a product of F’ed up social situation based on racism in white society.

lol……

PS: Feel free to ignore my posts if you wish. I have no problem with it. My only request is if you do decide to attack my points, at least put the following portion in it.

“You’re wrong and here’s the reason why: ”

Before you know it, you’ll be using quotes like “Everyone knows that…”

uRB4N, man, where the hell do you live being surrounded by all these Asians who’re messing up your life? Cause not only are you pissed at all the Asian women, you’re haranguing at all the Asian men as well. I can appreciate the passion you have in this topic, but you’re seriously starting to sound like one of those bitter losers who thinks everybody else have problems except himself. What are you trying to provoke here? Anger? What are you trying to teach everyone? To be angry? Because all these “points” you have basically boils down to being angry at Asian women because they’re the ones at fault. But wait, no, now it’s the Asian men who are at fault, too. Thanks for the scolding, dad, but I think I’ve long learned to live my own life, like most other Asian men out there (or at least the ones I know).

Want to know about the people in my family? One of my cousins is a VP at Goldman Sachs. Another one is the head of his department at Credit Suesse. And another is a partner at her law firm. And they’re all in their early 30s. And yet another who’s only 22 and co-founder of a company that was featured in Businessweek. I was promoted twice in my company of 1000 employees in the 3 years since I was there. And we’re all immigrants, our parents brought us to the US from China with little more than the clothes on our backs. Despite dealing with racism, language barriers, and being limited to working menial jobs even though they all have college degrees (not an easy accomplishment in China), they provided their children with more opportunities and privileges than most people can dream of.

Followers? Nerds? Losers? I don’t know what lofty standards you hold for Asian Americans, but if dating whites or yelling at other Asians for not being as successful is a standard, then buddy, you need to shift priorities. And the real kicker is, I don’t think my family’s story is unique at all. Asian Americans did not fail because of racism. We’ve come a long way in spite of it. Sure, we still got a long way to go, but if you think we’re accomplished nothing simply because the white media would rather celebrate the Tila Tequilas and William Hungs instead of the real every day Asian heroes, man talk about missing the forest for the trees.

“I’ve said this over and over again — all these studies and surveys about height across races and ethnicities is pretty much two steps away from scientific racism.”

That’s one thing that also crossed my mind. It’s like 19th-century scientific racism repackaged for a 21st-century audience. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

“IR is not the solution, its a symptom of the problem, a product of F’ed up social situation based on racism in white society.”

This is very true. The IR phenomenon/divisiveness are definitely *symptoms* of a deeper problem that really doesn’t get addressed.

Way back in the 1970s, Frank Chin said that Asian American suffered from “the destruction of an organic sense of identity, the complete psychological and cultural subjugation of a race of people.”

The result was a condition of self-contempt: when Asian Americans accept “white standards of objectivity, beauty, behavior, and achievement as morally absolute,” they also deep down realize that they can never fully measure up to these standards–because they are the wrong race.

And the high outmarriage rates in Asian America, Chin said, ultimately reflected “a people who failed to generate an identity and culture attractive and compulsive enough to make our people attractive to each other and survive as a people and grow as a culture”

In other words, without a distinctive Asian American culture, there really is nothing that holds “Asian America” together as a people.

Also, the animosity that you see between Asian American men and women is an almost textbook example of what disempowered minority groups in general often experience.

When you are a minority, it’s easier to fight other people in your community instead of fighting the broader system that keeps you down.

It’s kind of analogous to the colonial mentality, the slave mindset.

And while it’s sometimes necessary to air out the tensions between AMs and AFs, this anger can also be counter-productive and plays right into the hands of divisive forces.

And divide and conquer is one of the oldest tactics in the world.

anna123:
Even though i felt sick in my stomach reading your distasteful post,(i mean who the f talks about romantic love like that?) ultimately I agree with your vulgar assessment of the situation BUT NOT the logic behind why it exists or how to address it.

I apologize for the distastefulness of my post. It is due to the fact that I was mostly addressing a male target audience.

The problem isn’t self interest, but how self interest and community have been separated in Asian identities. Like they say, divide and conquer…if there’s no sense of “Asian community” Asians themselves will do the bidding of the dominant majority, and will destroy their own community through intermarriage and assimilation into white society. As Frank Chin would say, if this happens “Asians as a social, cultural and political force will have been neutralized”

Placing the needs of the family, community, or society over that of the individual has always been a distinguishing characteristic of most East Asian NeoConfucianism-based civilizations. I believe that this is a downfall of Asian civilization. I believe that the individual is more important than the community because the community is ultimately composed of individuals. If the individuals are unhappy or unfulfilled then the community is like a flimsy house of cards, ready to collapse at any moment. When the community is given primacy over the individual it becomes very oppressive in its own way. I also believe this is the reason why so many Asian women become disaffected with the Asian community (and, by extension, Asian men) but ultimately it is oppressive to both Asian men and women as individuals. But, upon close examination, I find that both men and women are responsible for this state of affairs. We Asian-Americans need to take inventory and stock of our core belief structures, values, assumptions and make changes where necessary. When we learn to value individual liberty within the proper constraints of universal moral law, then this entity that we refer to as the “Asian community” becomes a far more appealing place.

When I was a child, I had a collection of tapes which contained traditional Korean folk tales. The moral of these tales would have something to do with hyodo or filial piety. I remember one tale, Shim Chung, which is about a devoted daughter of an old, impoverished blind man who offers herself to fishermen who need to offer a human sacrifice to the gods in order to calm the seas. In exchange, her father would be provided for the rest of his life.

Now I believe that one must be respectful toward one’s parents but I also witness many of my peers who practice blind, unthinking filial piety. If you replace parents with family or community, you have the same pattern. Oftentimes, though, Confucian principles of reciprocity, equally important, are ignored. How are they enforced? Hierarchical relational frameworks become merely convenient vehicles of abuse by those with greater power whether they be parents, elders, community, or state. This has to stop.

Really? As an AZN female, i dont blame IR disparity on Asian males. I blame white people and their supremacist culture.

I am not such an advocate of AZN Pride. The problem with unthinking ethnic pride is that it is rather like religious fundamentalism and can lead to irrationalities. Ethnic pride renders one blind to the faults within the community and no community is perfect. Sometimes extreme ethnic pride creates a bunker mentality and induces one to defend the indefensible. Reactionary ethnic pride was always a bane of the black community and a major factor in what kept that community from progress for so long.

In any case, raw ethnic pride is an emotional response and unbecoming for men, for whom emotion should be led by the intellect, not the other way around.

I also do not believe that blaming the White privilege hegemony is a productive enterprise. It breeds a helpless, victimization complex and distracts attention and energy from the faults within our own domain and control, which I believe is more responsible for our problem. While White hegemony is real, fact remains that Asians are the ones who are conforming to its dictates. I cannot overemphasize the importance of facing up to this reality and dealing with it.

Finally, when I encourage Asian men to “diversify their portfolio”, I am not asking them to dismiss Asian women from their selection pool. All I am saying that they should be more far openminded about their choices because we still do have a Disparity after all and by the law of conservation, I also assume that all the Asian men that Asian women have NOT chosen as mates do not wish to be single and alone for the rest of their lives. I also state that for those Asian men who are open to IR, they should not be solely fixated on White women, which I find often to be the case. I find that to be a problem also. Own up to the fact that you are the underdog in this game and are in no position to be biased when it fact you are the recipient of bias, from all sides, itself. At the risk of sounding rather harsh: beggars cannot be choosers.

Kobukson, I disagree with you. Your Eastern vs. Western values comparison might be valid if both share equal influence in this country, but that is not the case. Your theory of these Asian characteristics as the cause of the problems in our community falls flat when confronted by the fact that white America is the dominant culture here. It is often discussed that the dominant culture is so prevalent as to cause the dissolution of minority communities which, in this case, happens to be the Asian American community. Hell, that is what we’ve been talking about this whole time!

I find it strange that you would focus on the “oppressive” nature of our cultural values, when many of us are lamenting the disappearance of our community with each passing generation. Fact is, the Asian children that grow up in this country are subjected to the dominant Western culture, not the Eastern one that holds practically no influence. What little influence it does have has long been perverted by western Orientalism. It has also been documented that children tend to follow the habits of their peers, not their parents. With their daily exposure to white media, and getting their education from institutions run by whites, which mindset do you think they will adopt? And despite what you think, people are social creatures and their dependency on their community is as much a basic need as food and sex.

Thus, the problems that Asian Americans face have little to do with the “failure” of Eastern values, and more due to the fact that we’ve adopted Western values as part of our assimilation. Our need to belong drives us, and when the powers that be continue to marginalize our community, our children find themselves with no foundation, no identity, and no individualism. So we seek our identity in the dominant culture that rejects us, and some of us try to compensate by overemphasizing our pursuits in individual gratification, material wealth, social status, all these supposed Western virtues that you extol. And in our selfishness we chose to forgo our responsibility to our community, and that short-sightedness will doom future generations of Asian Americans to the same thing.

Contrary to your belief, it is our selfishness, not selflessness, that’s what got us in this situation in the first place. If we hope to maintain our individualism, we would do well to remember the values of our ancestors, and realize that individual survival comes from strong, healthy communities. Otherwise, selfishness would be the downfall of Asian Americans.

i’ve been busy and late to catch up on this thread but nice posts. i appreciate those who have been able to articulate their perspectives, it has given me quite a bit to think about as well. just some quick thoughts, and they might not be well thought out as i’m riffing off the top of my head:

i am reminded about how Native Americans have really had to struggle to maintain themselves as a people and not be relegated to the dustbin of history. Anna has made a very insightful point about the disintegration of Asian culture and people, being so assimilated that we become absorbed by the predominant white culture around us, inter-married to the point where we cease to exist.

i understand both views on ethnic pride. i don’t fall into the militant camp of identity politics, but i think it needs to exist. yet, i am not one to be constantly brimming with anger and taking on all perceived slights. Like Leon said, there are times for explosive anger and emotions and times for cool logic. i do have a sense though that the AA activist commmunity has been too calm and maybe needs an Al Sharpton type.

while it would be great to find an Asian female as a mate for life, it might happen for some of use. Sometimes you don’t get to fulfill your desires. True, a lot of AA males have been fixated too much on white women. But if it feels right, then take love and happiness where you can. Life is too goddamn short.

Kobukson, I disagree with the logic youve expressed on so many levels. Its the whole schema of the logic thats flawed. I will break it down into points;

1 “Placing the needs of the family, community, or society over that of the individual has always been a distinguishing characteristic of most East Asian NeoConfucianism-based civilizations. I believe that this is a downfall of Asian civilization…..etc etc”

Firstly when i refer to Asian, I’m strictly referring to yellow people born in Caucasian dominant countries especially the “Anglosphere” such as U.S UK Canada, Australia. So when i speak about “Asian” it means Asian Identity Politics in the “west”. Asians from the west aka AZNS and Asians from the East are totally seperate and distinct everything.

Secondly What does “Neo Confucianism” of “East Asian civilisations” have to do with the AZN experience in the U.S? Its not even related. You are attacking the “Confucianism” of Asian culture in Asia and somehow relating it to the AZN experience in the U.S while implying that U.S “individualism” is superior(which also sets up the dichotomy that Asians AND Azns are ALL confucianist collectivists-and does not reflect the truth, which is that both Asians and AZNS are individualists as well-individualism isnt unique to Caucasians). It sounds like Amy Tan thought, blaming the racial problems of AZNS in the west on the backward culture they brought with them from the East. That whole thinking is untrue, false and inaccurate.

Also, youre saying that because SOME Azns want to increase community awareness and develope an Azn Identity for themselves, family and community, thats “Neo Confucianism”? because “individual is more important than the community?” What are you going on about Kobukson?

Were the Black Panthers NeoConfucianist? what about Malcolm X? Is Al Sharpton NeoConfucianist? ….thought so. Well according to your logic they would be right? because they want to assist their community. Or are you only saying that when referring to Asians in the West because theres a “racial” link between Asians and Confucianism?(sarcasm)

2 “I am not such an advocate of AZN Pride. The problem with unthinking ethnic pride is that it is rather like religious fundamentalism and can lead to irrationalities…etc etc”

Yep, theres nothing to be proud of being an AZN and all. We should be ashamed. Caucasian/Western culture tells Asians and AZNS through media stereotypes, depictions in films/tv/movies that we are inferior and less because of the very identity that caucasians have assigned to us. We as AZNS should just accept it, and the inferior position we are socially relegated to. (sarcasm)

3 “I also do not believe that blaming the White privilege hegemony is a productive enterprise. It breeds a helpless, victimization complex and distracts attention and energy from the faults within our own domain and control, which I believe is more responsible for our problem. While White hegemony is real, fact remains that Asians are the ones who are conforming to its dictates…etc etc”

Yep, its the fault of Asians themselves when we face racism from white culture. Oh no, all those years of discriminatory immigration laws, land ownership laws, media stereotypes against asians, thats not the fault of white racism, its the fault of Asian people.(sarcasm)
Next you’ll say that Vincent Chin was responsible for his own death because he had a “victimisation complex” about the white racism he fought back against.

Do you see how ridiculous your logic is Kobukson? The problem is that your argument mixes in truth with lies so it can be difficult to work out what youre really trying to say. On the surface you use these universal attractive “humanist” concepts but the subtext suggests otherwise.

Sarcasm aside, points 2 and 3 aka ethnic pride and blaming white privilege, well if you know anything about the “psychology of prejudice” and “positive self identities” or “social mirror theory” you would understand why the arguments you offered are inherently flawed. Thats not just my personal opinion, either- its decades of research and studies undertaken in the field of social psychology since the 1950s. If you google those concepts, maybe a more informed opinion can be reached.

In conclusion, the arguments that you suggested seem to be flawed, and based on incorrect assumptions.

Anna, I think your passion to uphold and defend the Asian-American honor is worthy of respect. For the besieged Asian-American man living in America, that’s actually sexy and quite a turn-on I wish more Asian-American women were like you. You are what I would refer to as a “Righteous Asian Babe”. But unfortunately, it seems such women are quite far and few in between.

Having said that, earlier in another post, I mentioned that the minority experience in a place like America is a constant tension between the philosophy of Martin Luther King, Jr and that of Malcolm X. There are times when we need to take the approach of MLK. There are other times when we have to adopt the stance of Malcolm X. It depends on what you’re dealing with. Overall, I believe that the key to constructing a proper minority identity, as Asian-Americans, requires a harmonious balance between the two. This is a concept expressed in Taoism and embodied by the Taijitu, which symbolizes unity in duality. I think it is also worthwhile to explore and re-discover the meanings within the Asian classics, combine them with the truths discovered by other cultures, and apply them to our postmodern reality. Just as the Europeans experienced a Renaissance when they re-discovered the forgotten Greek classics (preserved throughout the Middle Ages by Arab scholars), I believe that Asian-American intellectuals and thinkers need to rediscover rich heritage of the Classics, combine them with the best practices and traditions of other cultures, and forge a new synthesis. We owe it to ourselves and future generations. As Kobe pointed out above, we need to define who we are in order to make progress. But too many of us are ignorant of the classics of both Eastern and Western civilization. Pop culture rushes in to fill this void. Garbage in, garbage out. What we refer to as “Asian-American community” as it stands now is merely a collection of people who happen to share a certain phenotype, most of them highly educated in glorified trade schools, and culturally impoverished in terms of what we can claim as uniquely our own and defining of our identity. In due time, I plan on starting my own blog where I intend to explore these ideas.

I realize that the militancy expressed by many Asian-Americans online is an overcompensating reaction to and desire to shed our unfortunate status as Model Minorities (hardworking, quiet, assimilating). I think it is a necessary phase. Personally, I am at a point in my own development where I’ve decided to move beyond that.

Secondly What does “Neo Confucianism” of “East Asian civilisations” have to do with the AZN experience in the U.S? Its not even related. You are attacking the “Confucianism” of Asian culture in Asia and somehow relating it to the AZN experience in the U.S while implying that U.S “individualism” is superior(which also sets up the dichotomy that Asians AND Azns are ALL confucianist collectivists-and does not reflect the truth, which is that both Asians and AZNS are individualists as well-individualism isnt unique to Caucasians). It sounds like Amy Tan thought, blaming the racial problems of AZNS in the west on the backward culture they brought with them from the East. That whole thinking is untrue, false and inaccurate.

Amy Tan exploited and distorted Chinese folk tales for the purpose of pandering to a White audience for the purpose of selling her fictional novels. What I am trying to do is examine Old World ways within the context of the New World for the purpose of analyzing our present condition with the aim of the betterment of our lot. Is it reasonable or even true to say that Old World ways are completely irrelevant to the Asian-American experience? I am not so sure. My basic proposition is that much of the problem we see in the Asian-American community is due the stubborn and residual influence of certain flawed Old World ways. I will explain what I mean by that in finer detail later.

lol, kobukson you are so full of it. I can see what youre doing. I said in a previous post that you mix lies with truth, and its very true, your writing is all smoke and mirrors. You put out bait, and even though some people take the bait and get caught up in your web of diversion, I’m not buying it.

Poor Leon is already caught up in your web, debating with you about “old world” vs “new world” and “east vs west”, lol, when that wasnt even relevant to the issue that was being discussed in the first place.

lol, Kobukson, do you even read what you write? hehehe, your writing style is so evasive and vague, and instead of addressing points you snake your way out by introducing totally irrelevant themes and concepts, which might seem to be valid, but on closer inspection really have nothing to do with anything, lol. Its like, you dont really know how to respond so you throw out random stuff hoping it will somehow work out for you….lol

hehehe…ahhh kobukson, i guess your posts are good for laughs eh? lol

Sometime i have to wonder whether people use more than one alias on this site just so that they can introduce opposing viewpoints on a post and then argue with themselves…cough..*kobukson*..cough….and laugh at all the people who take their arguments at face value….lol

When I speak of Old World ways, specifically I am referring to the relationship that Asians have towards authority. I have very good reasons to believe that residual Old World shaped attitudes towards authority affects even Asian-Americans today. Nowhere in my previous posts did I state that liberty or individualism, or humanism, is uniquely Western. By humanism, I mean the notion that institutions exist to serve the individual and not the other way around. I am not engaging in Orientalism. Orientalism posits a Western value-system as the normative basis to interpret other cultures, often to the effect of portraying it as alien or evil, in order to buttress Western superiority and/or justify Western hegemony over other peoples. I don’t know what label to call what I am trying to do. But what I am attempting is to familiarize myself and others with classical and neo-classical Asian thought (because we are of Asian heritage, after all), use that as the normative starting point, trace how things evolved along the way, pinpoint how it may affect our inner lives today in order to understand our condition in the present. Also, I want to expose the fallacy of automatically attributing something as a Western value. I mention individualism or liberty and already people are assuming that these are uniquely Western values. They are not. Ironically, this in itself is a manifestation of the heavy influence of Orientalism among Asian-Americans. I cannot overemphasize how much we Asian-Americans need to learn Asian history and thought. In the universities, we are indoctrinated that Dead White Males invented, discovered, and formulated just about everything under the sun. We need to study the Dead Oriental Males as well. Just as we are thought to believe that the printing press was invented by Gutenberg and therefore a Western invention (the printing press was used in Buddhist temples about 200 years before Gutenberg) we also fall into the fallacy that certain concepts like liberty are uniquely Western when in fact they occurred in Eastern writings as well. One of the things I’m also trying to do is identify the areas where the Dead Oriental Males were independently in agreement with Dead White Males. These areas that were in mutual agreement although separated by time and space are then no longer uniquely Eastern or Western values but universal truths that apply to all of humanity.

Why deal with all this Eastern and Western stuff, you may ask? Even Professor Edward Said, who wrote Orientalism, which I have read, had to think long and hard about the East and West in order to formulate his thesis. Said explored the consequences of allowing Western Civ to be the normalized reference point for understanding the East. What I am saying is OK, then, let’s normalize the East and see where that takes us. But in order to do that we have to know the East. How many of us are actually doing that? Identity politics is not enough. The way I see it, identity politics is largely the exercise of grievance-making. The ironic thing about identity politics is that if we did have a strong, healthy sense of identity, much of identity politics would be unnecessary. At the end of the day, after much outrage has been spent, you realize that you still don’t have an identity. In the context of IR disparity, one may blame Asian women, White men, the System, media bias, and what not until they are blue in the face but at the end of the day, Asian men have still not articulated with strength and persuasion why he is a better choice and why the Asian-American community, culture, and identity is worthwhile to uphold, defend, and maintain or what that community, culture, and identity even means exactly. “Just because we’re both Asian” is simply not good enough. As Larry points out, quoting Frank Chin: Way back in the 1970s, Frank Chin said that Asian American suffered from “the destruction of an organic sense of identity, the complete psychological and cultural subjugation of a race of people.”. We have a choice, people. We can wallow in a “Dark Ages” of ignorance, not even knowing our own history, cultural, and intellectual tradition, surrounded mostly by pop culture and stereotypes, allowing ourselves to be defeated by Orientalism in ways that we don’t even realize. Or we can begin the hard, difficult task of building our identity, culture, community within the realm of ideas. Each of us will have different ways of going about doing this. Jaewhan likes writing and is looking to break into fiction. I like writing also but my style is mostly prosaic and unfit for creative fiction. I like history and philosophy so those are the areas I tend to lean toward. Everyone’s distinct talent and strength is important and necessary.

Leon:
Also, I’m starting to agree with her that you come across as someone who either does not share the Asian American experience or an Asian who thinks if he detaches himself from the emotional side of the issues he is somehow above the “rank and file”. You’ll have to excuse me for sounding a bit harsh, but you have the cool detachment of an outside observer that does little to lend credence to your posts. If you have no stake in our community, what gives you the right to criticize our values?

I have trained myself to have this detachment because it is important to maintain objectivity. Professionals such as journalists and academics have to be objective otherwise they lose credibility. I look at issues from all angles. It may not be as emotionally satisfying to a hardcore militant but I am interested in the truth. And the truth is not always easy to swallow. I would hope people here are mature enough to handle this. I will say it again, identity politics tends to be very one-sided and lacking in objectivity.

Anna, well, I’m disappointed. We’re obviously on very different wavelengths. I seriously don’t know why you think I’m trying to make fun of anybody because I’m not. Please stop ascribing such slanderous remarks to me, especially when I have been quite polite to you. We Koreans have a word to describe this, when someone is being unnecessarily suspicious, refuses to accept things at face-value, and keeps ascribing 2nd or 3rd order hidden motives to something or someone. We call that janmeori. The Orientalists had a term for it also: “the inscrutable Oriental mind.” Stop it.

For those who may be interested in how residual Old World mentalities still affect Asian-Americans, I will give an example.

When the Virginia Tech Massacre happened, when that Korean student Cho Seung Hui killed his fellow classmates and himself, why did the Korean-American community react the way it did. Community leaders came out and apologized for what this guy did. Not only that, fearing some kind of reprisal, many Korean-American students did not attend class following the shooting and hid in their dorms.

Is the community responsible for the actions of an deranged member? If one Korean-American commits an atrocity are other Korean-Americans somehow liable as well? Why did Korean-Americans react as if these statements are true? Is this the behavior of a independent-minded people that truly believes in individualism or a collectivist-minded people operating on a shame-based ethic?

But since the topic is IR disparity, I will submit again that Old World-ish attitudes, influenced by our parents generation, is endemic in both Asian-American men and women when it comes to this issue and it is breeding much distrust between the genders. The sooner we identify what these are, and own up to it and take responsibility for it the better.

I actually read that Joong Ang Ilbo article several months ago. Mr Coyner’s characterization of janmeori is accurate. But like you said, like the concept of “chutzpah”, it doesn’t have an easy analogous equivalent in English.

Attraction is a function of a million different variables of which physical height is merely one of the variables. The bad news for short guys is, yeah, women generally seem to prefer taller guys. I know a short Jewish guy who’s never had a girlfriend in his entire life. To tell you the truth, though, even though he was short, if he had a decent personality and confidence, I think he would have had little trouble finding somebody. But in reality, he was insecure about his height. That made him thin-skinned and highly sensitive and such people are not easy to get along with. My other friends and I had an inside joke about how dealing with him was like dealing with a psycho girl, with none of the benefits of him actually being a girl.

I think relative proportionality also matters. A girl who is like 5′2″ with a guy who is over 6′ tall looks very freakish. A good rule of thumb to follow is that the relative proportionality of height should be such that it is comfortable to mutually engage in a 69 position. Obviously, a 5′2″ girl and a 6′+ guy would have some ergonomic difficulties with that.

old world, new world. still, it gets down to a question i have posed before. what does it mean to be Asian American? who gets to set the criteria and define what it means? what does it mean to be American?

just because I can’t speak Chinese, does that make me less of an Asian? And if I do, does that make me less of an American?

This is one of the reasons why I explore philosophy. Your questions are essentially philosophical questions: who am I? What am I doing here? Where am I going? Etc.

I think there is a cognitive fallacy that things like “culture” or “ethnic identity” are essentially timeless, static qualities. Fact is, culture and identity are organic. They evolve.

I’ll give an example. Kimchi is considered a signature artifact of Korean food culture. When most Koreans think of kimchi, they think of a pickled vegetable such as cabbage and radish with ample amounts of red hot chili peppers. The redness and hotness of the chili peppers is what makes kimchi a kimchi. But historically, red hot chili peppers did not grow naturally in Korea. Where did they come from? Chili peppers were first discovered in the New World, the Americas, by the Spaniards. They arrived in Korea during the late 17th century by way of Portuguese traders via Japan. In fact, my late grandmother, who was born and raised in a village in a northern part of Korea never saw red kimchi until she met my grandfather, who came from a more southern village. Until then she thought kimchi was supposed to be white. At one point in Korea’s past, red hot chili peppers were considered a foreign novelty. Since then, it has been so heavily used in the food culture that it is considered an essential element of Korean food identification. Culture and identity is organic and it evolves.

The author of a book I am reading “Culture-Making” gets deep into a lot of these topics. He compares culture and identity to a plant or a garden. Gardens must be tended to, nurtured, pruned, etc. He states there are four things that people do when shaping culture: copy, critique, cultivate, and create. I believe that at this stage in the evolution of the Asian-American identity, we’ve been quite very good at copying, good at critique. Not so good at cultivation or creation, which are more harder.

still, whose standards of beauty are we applying and to whom in this so called study?

my questions may be philosophical in your view, but i see it as one of alienation and existentialist from existing in a white dominated culture. it has been suggested in this thread that there is inauthenticity because someone might not exhibit full “Asian-ness” before being American. I don’t know what that actually means, but I have posted about the bi-cultural pull that we Asian Americans have. There’s the duality that we possess. I think you just have to simply…be. It’s yin and yang. One cannot exist without the other. Splitting one’s self up into two separate entities is bizarre.

I am not self segregated from the greater community around me (ie, the predominant white culture). I interact with it and can navigate my way around. I am fully immersed in it. But I can feel comfortable in the Chinese community even if I can’t speak the language of my ancestors either, just a few phrases. Does that make me less of an Asian?

And what makes one an American? How do you define what an American is? And ultimately, how are we to fit into the mosaic? The only answer I have is, just simply exist and simply be.

Kobukson, it’s interesting that you seem to study so much yet understand so little. Identity politics are by nature one-sided, because in order for an ethnocentric community to exist, its members must be first and foremost, ethnocentric.

Leon, I think you are talking oranges while I was talking apples. I was discussing identity-making not identity politics. It was in response to Mojo’s question regarding his lack of knowledge of Mandarin or Cantonese (”Chinese” is not a language, btw, anymore than “American” is a language) and whether that makes him less Asian or more American or what. Our generation is perpetually caught in this state of confusion. But in order to have an identity, and slice through the confusion, we must understand the very nature of identity itself. And we must revisit our Asian roots and trace how we got to where we are now. And that is what I was doing. Sometimes I feel that our generation, ignorant of Asian roots, heritage, and culture, only exposed to Western stereotypes, embody the worst excesses of both Asia and the West instead of the best.

Identity politics is not Asian-centric, BTW. Identity politics (in America) is White-centric. Identity politics is the exercise of grievance-making versus White hegemony. By definition, it positions White hegemony as a central reference point around which our minority-status grievance-making revolves around. Grievance-making is not identity-making. Grievance is not an identity. If you remove White hegemony from the picture, go some place where there’s no White people, then what?

Duh. This is the very reason why the grassroots of any growing community these days cannot be represented solely by advocates that date/marry members outside their community. That would simply result in a lack of cohesion. This is the stuff that many people here have been discussing over and over, and I’m starting to feel their frustration. You are arguing the premise that these discussions are Asian-centric, so they lack objectivity and thus lack credibility. I disagree.

I say that identity politics is one-sided and lacking in objectivity because it basically says all our problems are White people’s fault. It never acknowledges that some of our problems might be due to our mistakes. This breeds a victimization complex. It also breeds a feeling of helplessness, despair, and eventually total apathy. You are basically saying that your reality (including problems) are always in other’s control and never your own (personal responsibility). Where is the hope in that? The reason why the Fighting 44’s forum eventually declined is because of the hopelessness and the internal contradictions of identity politics. Flawed identity politics is also what prevented the Black community from progress for so long and continues to do so. The educational achievement gap of inner city students is considered one of the unfinished battles of the Civil Rights Movement. The reason why it is still a battle is because for too long the blame was always focused on racism or the Man when in reality much of the source of the problems lay within the Black community and families themselves. Studious Black students were ridiculed for “trying to be White” (again, identity politics is White-centric) by their less motivated peers. Fathers are largely absent in Black urban families. Pop culture constantly pounds the message that academic achievement is not cool. No wonder there is an achievement gap. Nowadays, Blacks are moving beyond this rigid dichotomy. When Blacks see Asian-American militancy and mindless identity politics that is unaware of its own blind-spot, they say “been there, done that”. We are like copy-cats imitating 90’s style gangsta rap while they have moved on to something else. Been there, done that.

Identity politics is also very dogmatic. It creates the confused mentality that if you dare to critique the internal flaws of your ethnic community, that you are a race-traitor. It is not for nothing that Political Correctness has often been compared to totalitarianism. PC is the closest thing that a free, democratic society such as the US has that resembles totalitarian thought-control. Kishore Mahbubani, who is a Asia-centric minded intellectual who has written many books, said individuals wither when all they have are uncritical lovers and unloving critics. The same can be said of communities.

Again, in order for anybody discussing these issues and claim to understand them, that person must first and foremost claim the Asian American experience as his own, and thus become more Asian-centric. This is why, an Asian woman with a white man at her side claiming to understand the struggles of the Asian man would find us questioning her credibility. In order to discuss identity politics, first claim the identity. Otherwise, you’re just a CNN reporter: stating facts with little understanding.

OK, I want to say a few things about the IR disparity debate since you brought it up again. A few things that probably have never been said before. This, too, is identity politics at its worst not best. If you think about it, there is really no shared “identity” here other than a shared physical phenotype and this is the basis upon which the IR debate rests. Furthermore, it is White-centric. It centers around bashing White men and White hegemony. It also bashes Asian-American women and this is the severe collateral damage of the IR debate wars. I have never really seen Asian-American men make a concerted effort of persuasion to Asian-American women why they should chose us based upon positive identification with Asian-American culture rather than attacking them. I think the reason why this is so is because the common identity and culture based upon substantials other than a shared phenotype is weak. So there’s nothing but attacks and fruitless, neverending blame-games. You can attack all you want but at the end of the day you still haven’t made a case for why the choice of an Asian-American man is better than a White guy. That is an act of identity-making, not politics. That, my friends, is being Asian-American centric. We’re not going to make any progress with the IR challenge unless we learned the art of attraction not repulsion, positivity not negativity. The IR debates, in its present form, causes much more harm than good.

This lack of understanding is amplified in your typical white-minded misinterpretation of the Korean American reaction to the Virginia Tech Massacre. Note how you never once considered the effects of white institutional news reporting, its reactions, and stereotyping that effects the Asian American community. As always, it’s the minority community’s fault. Did you ever consider that the reactions are due to actual REAL fears of reprisals from the dominant white society, and less of the so-called “old world collective-mindset”?

But has there been any reprisals? No. It is one thing if there had been, in fact, reprisals and the KA community reacted the way it did. But the KA community acted as if there were reprisals when in fact there were none. This is what common-sense people call “ass-backwardness”.

Look, one of our problems as a minority is that often, the actions of an individual is held representative of the community. This is stereotyping. If someone stereotypes, then we have to oppose that. But surely, you can see how things could get really damn confusing for everybody, when a minority preemptively acts as if “act of an individual = the whole community” is true. It’s either one or the other. Consistency, people!

Leon,

I am not denying White privilege exists. I am not denying that institutional racism exists. I am not saying it is not important to reveal injustices. Also, I am not saying that activism, combating the above, is not crucial. These are all very important.

I have also gone through my own “militant phase” and while I have learned a lot from it, I have also witnessed how blind militancy can be self-destructive and can be a kind of ideological fundamentalism. Identity politics is a tool towards a goal, it is not the end-all and be-all for one’s cognitive worldview or a lifestyle. I am merely wondering if some of us has allowed identity politics to consume far too much of one’s worldview in a manner that is unhealthy and unbalanced. It is worthwhile to consider that.

At any case, Leon, I can sense that you have your strong convictions and I have mine. We may be at different places in our lives also and we have to account for that. Let’s just agree to disagree and keep things civil. I am not an arrogant person, just merely one who is sharing a different perspective. I am not here to argue with you for the sake of arguing, or to “win an argument” or to “convert” you or anything and I hope you are not either. I’m just throwing some ideas out there. We can’t all have exactly the same thoughts or ideas because after all we are not some monolithic Asian-American bloc, right? But at the same time, we all believe in and struggle for a healthy and vibrant Asian-American identity, culture, and community.

Finally, ideologies should serve people. People should not serve ideologies.

i think there’s room for differing viewpoints; afterall, how can we possibly learn or gain additional insight if we don’t receive different ideas and views? Granted, I don’t necessarily subscribe or agree to everything I’ve read. I do appreciate the depth and breadth of knowledge some have taken in their responses.

Me, personally, I am against extremism or any fundamentalist thought. Yet, I think for our concerns, there’s need to be a militant element in our community. I won’t always agree with the reactionaries, yet they are often the ones to spearhead and take charge of things that need to be addressed. I think at times, the AA community has been too plodding in responding to blatant racism. There are times to be calm and rationale, and there are times to be a fist up someone’s ass—to make them squirm.

Still, this subject is still the same old tired bullshit. As stated previously, this study is veering on the edge of racist conclusions, hiding behind academia, yet not being critiqued by peer review. Just who were these social economists who conducted this study? Again, just whose standards of beauty and attractiveness are we going by? Sure, there is something to be said for balance between two partners when it comes to height differential. But as it was stated before, the laws of attraction contain many, many variables.

This study doesn’t get to the root cause of anything.